Chinese worker trapped under sea for 18 hours

BEIJING - A Chinese worker has been trapped in a one-metre diameter canister under sea for almost 18 hours as the rescue work continues, a media report said Friday.

The accident occurred around 9 a.m. Thursday off the coast of China’s eastern Zhejiang province, when the steel shielding canister in which he was working, deformed under sudden rise of hydraulic pressure from flood tide.

Fan, 43, has been stuck at the bottom since then, People’s Daily reported. The canister, a part of an offshore platform, is one meter in diameter.

“We are making slow progress because of complex geological conditions. The deformed section, about two to four meters under the sea surface, has been squeezed to only three centimetres wide at the narrowest part,” a rescue worker said. Food is being supplied to the worker through a pipe.